The Last of Us EP18: Prince of Pittsburgh

By Shamus Posted Friday Nov 7, 2014

Filed under: Spoiler Warning 80 comments


Link (YouTube)

Rutskarn is correct, the subtitle did indeed have a glaring error: “I saved you’re ass from that clicker last week.” This is all the more alarming when you realize this is the remastered edition of the game. Either nobody noticed it, or people noticed it but nobody bothered to fix it. Strange.

At the two and a half minute mark, the vehicle outside sees movement inside the building and instantly begins pumping turret fire into the room, despite the fact that their own guys are also in the room. That turret is flagrantly robotic, to the point where it has no regard for friendly fire or ammo conservation, and continues to track the player even when they are out of view. Oh, videogames.

This “leaving Pittsburgh” thing is starting to feel like that one plot door in Neverwinter Nights 2 where a significant percent of the running time is expended doing something that feels like it should be simple. Our only goal is to get away from these idiot raiders. If they were just a group of a hundred tightly-packed guys then it should be easy to get away from the area where they patrol. The way they infest every building and parking lot – and the fact that they ambushed Sam’s party earlier in a different part of the city – makes it feel like they are everywhere. Are there ten thousand raiders downtown? Is this a city where ten thousand adult men do nothing but drive around their own desolate town looking for random people to gank?

We entered Pittsburgh at the end of episode 12. We’re now on ep 18. A full third of our running time has been spent trying to leave this town, and we’re still not close to done.

 


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80 thoughts on “The Last of Us EP18: Prince of Pittsburgh

  1. Daemian Lucifer says:

    Josh,why didnt you scroll down the text in that note?Damn you for that cliffhanger!Please,open it up in the next episode and show us the whole text.

    @23:21
    ENEMIES EVERYWHERE!

    But microtransactions arent made in pittsburg,they are made in canada.They are the work of canadian devil.

    1. Alexander The 1st says:

      On the other hand “This video isn’t available from your location” very likely *is* made in Pittsburg.

  2. Daemian Lucifer says:

    Shamus you really have to play I am alive.

    Its a post apocalyptic video game where bullets are so rare that the best use for your gun is to point it at the enemies and bluff your way out of the encounter.It works even if you dont have any bullets in the gun,which is often.You usually have 1 or less bullets available to you,so of course you dont want to use them unless you meet someone who also has a gun and a bullet.

    The enemies also try to employ the same tactic on you,and you have to raise your hands and let them slowly approach you and then jump them at the correct moment(difficult,since usually therell be multiple enemies there).

    1. Scourge says:

      I was about to suggest that game as well. Damn. It was good. (Sure, the German version was of course censored so you couldn’t threaten the people, but it was still good)

      Of course once you get the bow things become a bit easier.

      1. Daemian Lucifer says:

        Wait,the threatening people with the gun was censored?How?Its one of the core gameplay elements?

        And even more baffling,why?With the bow you dont just threaten them,you murder them.What,upright murder is ok,but scaring them off with a gun is not?

  3. Daemian Lucifer says:

    Ok,I know I was talking about kids in this setting naturally being proficient in self defense,but DAAAAYM! ellie is a killing machine!I think that she didnt actually train in a military school,but was genetically engineered there.Which would also explain why she is immune:She isnt really human.Still a lovable nerd,though.

    1. Jakale says:

      I’ve enjoyed when we see her get a kill, cause watching her get flailed about by the enemy and then they just drop dead is really entertaining to watch.

  4. Dragomok says:

    Is this a city where ten thousand adult men do nothing but drive around their own desolate town looking for random people to gank?

    Sounds like my kind of MMO.

    1. James says:

      i could make an injoke about how recently eve has been like this in Providence and Catch (two southern regions of space) but it is a in joke and i doubt anyone who doesnt keep up to date with the meta game would find funny

    2. Patrick the Feces Station Attendant says:

      Sounds like Newark. Which would actually make a decent game. Forget the post-apocalyptic thing….leave a NY Jets game on a Monday night and make it home alive. You wouldn’t need to suspend disbelief of anything.

  5. Thomas says:

    I hate the tank so much. It feels completely Uncharted, it’s tapping into all the wrong kinds of feelings

    1. Jakale says:

      I’m mostly baffled that it can get anywhere. Before all this bandit business started, I figured the choked roads would force walking. Granted, this was apparently a military-run city for a while before the revolt, so that area being relatively clear fits, but enough to let a big vehicle like that to dog the footsteps of the much more mobile Henry and Sam for however long they’ve been escaping?

    2. newdarkcloud says:

      Yeah. It feels so out of place in a game that otherwise feels plausible. Even if the military left a tank sitting there as they left (instead of using it to fight), and most it would be a stationary turret defending some military building, which could be used as a sort of shelter.

      Especially since I doubt anyone there was trained on how to drive a tank.

      1. syal says:

        And driving one the distance they did takes like a year’s supply of gas or something.

      2. guy says:

        Is that really a tank? It looks to me like a turret attached to a truck. I’m not sure the vehicle was originally military, much less originally connected to the turret.

        Checking the wiki, it’s apparently a humvee with some extra armor and stuff added by the raiders. As for why they have one, it’s pretty likely a military quarantine zone would have some military vehicles.

  6. hborrgg says:

    I think we’ve killed more pittsburghians than we killed in fallout at this point.

    1. SpiritBearr says:

      For some reason I remember a genocide of Boomer proportions in the Pitt

  7. Thomas says:

    Generally in this game there are just too many people to be killed. I like the level of combat, I just don’t like how long the combat goes on for. If each faction had half the people in it, it would feel so much more tone appropriate and it would stop combat fatigue.

    If in lots of areas it was just 3 guys, and not the 6 guys who came up as reinforcements it would feel so much better

    1. Tizzy says:

      Why is it that so many games seem to assume that twice the combat will make their game twice as good? It’s even worse in games that give you xp for killing monsters, because all of a sudden you find yourself forced into combat just so that you can climb that imaginary ladder which is not all that relevant to begin with.

  8. Double H says:

    You talked about how you would like to see games where the enemies conserve their ammo and that would be interesting but I would also like to see games where the enemies would try to preserve their own life. I think it would be interesting to see games where the enemies aren’t just trying to kill the player but also get away from the confrontation unharmed. I’m becoming bored with games where they just stand in the open waiting for the player to mow them down.

    1. Alex says:

      I agree with this. I would love it if Bethesda picked this up for their games. It would be great if you could win fights by forcing enemies to flee or even surrender (making them valid targets for something akin to pickpocketing them, where you can take stuff from them but taking too much risks them fighting back), and in turn had the ability to surrender and lose some of your gear if you can’t win and can’t get away.

      Each faction already has Reputation stats for each of the other factions, so you’d want to add a few extra variables to control whether or not they will retreat and whether or not they’ll surrender – nobody should try to surrender to a radscorpion, for example.

      1. James says:

        There is in Fallout 3 a random encounter where a guy tries to bluff you with a sawn-off shotgun that has no bullets, i think you can either speech or guns check him, and it was a funny and fun little random event. and considering in Fallout games all npc’s have inventory it might not be hard to do, maby…

      2. TmanEd says:

        You mentioning Bethesda reminded me of the first time I played Skyrim. The first time I noticed an enemy fall down and beg for mercy I decided I would sheathe my sword and see what happened. They immediately got up and tried to shank me. I even tried it a few more times, wondering if that was one of a few possible outcomes (maybe they run away, or give some loot as thanks for sparing them, or something), but nope. A shame, because something like that would go a way toward making the enemies a bit more believable.

        1. Florian the Mediocre says:

          Fun fact: On semi-rare occasions, bandits actually do run away for good.

          I never quite figured out what exactly causes them to do that. It happens maybe once every fifty bandits.

          1. Thomas says:

            If they were more consistently running away, it’d make it so much more impactful when they don’t.

            Say if the game was balanced around most enemies running away after a certain health point, or if a number of their friends have did and then you came up against some fanatical cultists or an elite guard, and you slogged to get them towards that sort of area … and then they stayed fighting to the death

            1. Florian the Mediocre says:

              That does sound pretty cool. Changing how quickly individuals and factions turn tail would definitely help to give them more personality.

              That said, I’m not sure if an Elder Scrolls game would be the best fit for this kind of mechanic – it would probably get pretty frustrating to have half your loot run away every fight.
              Plus, in dungeons, it would look odd if the panicked, bleeding survivor ran past their buddies and they didn’t react to it. (And if they did react you’d probably pretty much have to fight everyone at once. It could be an interesting mechanic to have to stop them before they can alert anyone, though.)

              1. Ivan says:

                Idk, Skyrim already drowns you in far more loot than you can carry, missing a few bits of armor wouldn’t hurt you at all. This would also help to add some depth to a game that was sorely lacking in it.

                Also for the record, anything that AI does is already odd. It really is the worst. You can shoot a dude in the face with an arrow and if they don’t find you then they’ll eventually calm down and assume it was nothing, and go back to sitting in their chair alone and doing nothing, despite the arrow still sticking out of their face.

              2. Alex says:

                It shouldn’t be consistent. Some would try to run away, some would try to surrender, and some would fight to the death, and morale should to an extent be “contagious”. If Alan is running away from battle and meets his mate Bob, there should be a chance that finding Bob rallies Alan and he and Bob run back into the fray. There should also be a chance that they rally and wait where they are in case you come after him. But there should also be a chance that seeing Alan running makes Bob run away too.

                As for the question of loot, different ways of dealing with enemies could be better for different types of loot. Retreating enemies might drop heavy items like weapons and shields, surrendering enemies might be willing to hand over valuables but not their clothes, and killing enemies might get you everything, but for more effort and with resale values reduced by the fact that half of it is covered in blood. If you want to loot a really nice suit of armour undamaged, the best way to do it might be to obliterate his mates with a flashy spell that terrorises him into surrendering unconditionally, or it might be to sneak up and slit his throat, or it might be to shoot him in the face with an arrow.

              3. Microwaviblerabbit says:

                The Elder Scrolls/Fallout games already have the basis for this in their AI programming. The Confidence/Aggression/Assistance npc behaviours govern this. At the moment the scale is too simplistic to allow for complex behaviours, being a 0 to 3 (or 4 in the case of confidence) scale. But the basis is there for future game/engine development.

                The easiest way to implement it would be to run scripts using the basic courage/pacify/frenzy spell effects. I know elements of this were used in Fallout New Vegas to try to change faction behaviours, like making Legion troops more confident when a standard bearer was present. It didn’t really work, (they obviously lacked the time and resources as with most of the game) but the principle stands.

                1. Scourge says:

                  It’s already been done with a mod as far as I can recall. So, it is definitely out of scale there.

            2. syal says:

              I approve of more games having Total War-style morale systems.

    2. Tizzy says:

      It takes a while for games to evolve. I’m cautiously optimistic that we’llget there someday…

      1. SpiritBearr says:

        Someone mentioned I Am Alive above and that was the industry trying out non-lethal encounters. It never really worked because they would immediately try to kill you if you pulled your gun off them. Gunpoint too was an attempt at it before the dev found it more fun just to jump off walls and rewrote the game.

    3. Ambitious Sloth says:

      There was an Ultima game that did this. One of the old ones at least. Maybe Ultima 4. Sometimes enemies enemies would sheath their weapons and flea, and the player had to let them run away with their loot and xp. All so that you could maintain a threshold for being called honorable which you needed for something. I forget exactly what.

      1. tmtvl says:

        You needed Honour so you could meditate at the Shrine of Honour and complete one of the eight steps needed to become The Avatar(tm)(r)(c).

        Problem was you also needed Valour which required you to kill enemies, but killing non-evil enemies or killing fleeing enemies hurt your Honour, so it was kinda tricky.

        Ultima VI was the best game, though. Not many games really tackle the issue of racism.

        1. Ambitious Sloth says:

          Ah, thank you. I remembered letting enemies run, but I didn’t remember why. Which left me hoping I didn’t just make something up and fit it in my memories like some sort of crazy. Thanks for showing me my sanity is still preserved! =D

      2. Ivan says:

        Damn, you didn’t even get xp? Not only is that rough, but it’s kinda gamey…

        1. Ambitious Sloth says:

          Yeah but it worked out ok, there were a lot of things to fight between the dungeons and random encounters. Besides that, getting xp mainly helped you in killing more things faster. I think it was there so that you had another way to build up your honor besides just doing quests. Still, it did feel like that system made those fights not a waste of time only by technicality though.

        2. Daemian Lucifer says:

          Didnt play the game,but from what Spoony was saying about it,its not.It actually makes sense.You are a paragon of virtues,so you have to act them out.Its the ultimate roleplaying.

          1. syal says:

            I would go so far as to say it’s the opposite of gamey. Gamey would be rewarding you for it.

          2. Ivan says:

            But, exp is already an abstraction of how experienced your character is in combat. If this was 100% accurate then encounters that almost killed you but you escaped from should give you the most exp, since we learn far more from failure than from success. However not only is the end of such an encounter ambiguous (you’re not sure when to award exp) but it also adds a great deal of potential for gaming the system.

            As such, it makes the most sense to award the player only for success. I don’t know about you but if my opponent were to lay down their weapon and run away, I would call that a success. Not only that but this is a clear end to the encounter and you can award exp now. You could also mark the NPC and say you’ll not be given any exp for killing this foe until the next time they engage you. You know, to prevent the player from double dipping.

            By awarding no exp if your opponent surrenders it’s sending a really weird message. Like the fight doesn’t count unless someone dies. Not being awarded loot from a fleeing opponent makes perfect sense, and if it’s supported by an honor system then that sounds like some good game design. But why exactly are you not gaining exp from a combat encounter that ends in the defeat of your opponent? It’s not like you’re eating their souls to gain their strength, right?… Unless you are… in which case, carry on.

            1. Daemian Lucifer says:

              You are missing the key point here:Sacrifice.All of the virtues are about some sort of sacrifice,whether its the time,loot or xp.In this case,you are sacrificing loot and xp in order to get the virtue of honor.If you were to award xp for fights regardless of the outcome,thered be no dilemma between getting the precious loot and xp and gaining the reputation as an honorable avatar.

            2. syal says:

              It’s less an abstraction of skill and more an abstraction of how fast and hard you hit. If you don’t kill your opponent, you aren’t using your strength and speed to their full potential, which means you aren’t going to hit harder or faster next time.

              I think they say professional show fighters and martial artists often lose in tavern brawls because they’ve trained themselves to hold back. You could see accepting a surrender as the same kind of thing.

    4. Felblood says:

      This is always nice to see.

      I can only think of a few games that allow you to use fear as a weapon that actually eliminates threats, rather than just de-buffing them.

      Total War and other historical wargames obviously tend to do this, but other than that:

      1. Baldur’s Gate. (or did you always have to hunt down and kill fleeing foes?)
      2. Shadow of Mordor (Fear runes are your friend if you need to solo a boss)
      3. X-Wing Versus Tie Fighter (Very rarely, the remnants of a squadron will hyper-jump out, to deny the player the chance to kill them.)

  9. The Ground Aviator says:

    I think it is a complete possibility that all of these mooks are just another type of fungal infection. They could basically just be the evolved form of clickers, after they find a place to bloom they sit there and spread until many full-formed adult male mooks are spawned. These mooks than live a short life, usually dying by the trail of fire and destruction left by the protagonist, while their corpses then bloom into a beautiful flower bed that will spread the fungus once more, completing the cycle. Ah. Nature.

  10. Isy says:

    You know, coming back to the gasoline thing – the gas should all be gone, but if you could find an old diesel-running truck or car, you can modify those things to run on vegetable oil. I have no idea how viable that is as a solution, but I’ll at least wager “more viable than using corrupted gasoline”.

    1. James says:

      You can also use poop amongst other things, even alcohol, and if, if, if! you have a farm you have cattle, cattle poop alot as do people so you could easily collect poop for fuel, infact why has noone done this in a game or post apoc film even just as a “yea cars in the pop apoc is weird here’s how they work”

    2. Torsten says:

      They would still need to have access to a fresh source, vegetable oil would not stay usable 20 years. Biofuels degrade even faster than fossile fuels, bioethanol goes bad in a few months.

      If they have a way to produce plant oils or alcohol large enough quantities, then it would be somewhat plausible there still being cars usable.

      1. Isy says:

        Someone said the “government” was able to produce car batteries, so biofuels and vegetable oils don’t seem like they’d blow out production capabilities. Random jerks like Bill would have a harder time of it, but then again, they need a whole lot less of it, since they’re only going to be driving one car (or two, if they’re really ambitious).

    3. Octapode says:

      I think the most likely solution for fuel in the post apocalypse is woodgas. The fuel doesn’t need processing on the scale of any liquid fuel, and isn’t going to detract anywhere near as much from food supplies (assuming you can spare the labour).

      Of course, the logistics of keeping something as complex as a car running with no industrial base would be pretty dire, but at least as far as fuel goes there are solutions.

      Incidentally, does anyone have a reference for busses being run on woodgas in WWII to save petrol for military use?

      1. Jonathan says:

        In addition to woodgas, you can make biogas from cow (or human) poop. It doesn’t take that many cows to supply enough to meet a homestead’s need.

        I have to head out soon, but if you want to see more, search for Geoff Lawton’s videos; there’s one on the topic that’s shot on-site with an existing, implemented system that provides pressurized natural gas from gravity-collected cow poop.

      2. Felblood says:

        I remember reading about WWII jeeps being modified to run on coal, by injecting partially burned coal smoke into the combustion chambers.

        The extra apparatus on the front would make such a modified vehicle pretty obvious though.

        I don’t have a link handy at the moment, as I am posting from the breakroom.

    4. Patrick the Feces Station Attendant says:

      I suppose all of this falls under “suspension of disbelief”,BUT…

      Using alternate versions of fuel(s)can sometimes be used in certain vehicles. Some diesel engines can be operated on the aforementioned alcohols and types of oils, but it a very short-term, one time use application.

      As in you might get an extra couple of miles out of an engine using vegetable oil, but only maybe one tank and the performance would suck. Before long the engine, plugs and valves would be completely ruined. The engine wouldn’t run on anything after that, not even the fuel it was normally designed for. It would be like running a computer off of a slightly different voltage, like 140 vs 120, or 2 phase instead of 3 phase.

      And all fuel types break down or settle before long. Even if you could find a unused tank of diesel fuel in a post apocalyptic world, chances are (unless it was kept in a temperature controlled environment and stirred every so often) it would have formed a semi-solid, kinda like Jello.

  11. Isaac says:

    What I want to know is, how do Henry and Sam still have straight hairlines?

    1. SpiritBearr says:

      They aren’t as wasteful as Joel and keep both sides of the blades of the scissors they pick up.

  12. Tychoxi says:

    “This is all the more alarming when you realize this is the remastered edition of the game. Either nobody noticed it, or people noticed it but nobody bothered to fix it. Strange.”

    Or maybe, it was *added* in the remastered edition in some nefarious plot!

    Also, RPGs have solved the problem of infinite bullets by having foes have an actual inventory. Once you use it up, change to melee. When the inventory bullets are beyond a certain threshold they’d ask for bullets to their teammates or curse. Shouldn’t be difficult.

    1. mhoff12358 says:

      Even in an RPG, having enemies believably use ammunition would be complicated. First of all, if they just blindly shot until they ran out, then the player would never get any ammunition drops, as the enemies would shoot it all away. Also, that would feel unrealistic as the event is going to wasn’t too conserve ammo just as much as the player is, so there would have to be systems taking that into account.

      1. tmtvl says:

        Yeah, you’d want something like
        if(canSeeEnemy()){
        if(ammoLvl > 0.25 || health < 0.25){
        shootGun();
        }
        else {
        fightMelee();
        }
        }

        To balance maintaining health and ammo.

        EDIT: Huh, code tags don’t respect spacing, oh well.

        1. newdarkcloud says:

          You could also have enemies retreat to some ammo stash in their base whenever they get low or run out.

          This ammo stash could be replenished on a weekly or monthly basis (assuming the player hasn’t murdered everyone) to simulate regular resupplying by hand-loaded or by trading with caravans.

      2. syal says:

        You could have the amount they carry be separate from the amount they drop, as long as how much they use is a limited amount. Gives a bit of a feel of “this is how many bullets they think you’re worth”.

        1. The mobs could also be guarding a cache of ammo/weapons. If the AI is complex enough, behaviors could be set up so that if the player alerts the enemy to their presence and a firefight ensues, the mobs might try to replenish their ammo from the cache, encouraging the player to take them down ASAP.

          1. Samyo says:

            The Arkham games actually do this, to an extent. In certain areas when Batman is spotted, they’ll run to small caches and grab a gun for themselves. It’s actually pretty interesting, gameplay-wise.

      3. Aitch says:

        Fallout managed it back in like ’97, it might not be as complex a problem as everyone’s making it out to be. Sometimes they’d run out of ammo and run for dear life, sometimes they’d pull out a melee weapon and close the distance. Sometimes they’d even pick up a new weapon off the ground. It even managed to depend on hitpoints and healing items and random chance too.

        One of the fun things to do would be to pickpocket a guard’s ammo and stimpacks before picking a fight and they’d run out after their first magazine. Additionally it added a nice bit of believability that there’d be more ammo and consumables to loot if you took them down quick, or next to nothing if it was a dire bit of combat.

        What amazes me are the excuses that people will come up with to avoid admitting a game’s flaws or odd developer’s decisions – I remember wondering out loud why I wasn’t allowed to zoom out or rotate my view during a game of Starcraft 2, or right click my base to constantly produce workers, or why there were no formation commands or behavior modifiers, and my friends were damn near angry about it, going on about how it would “break the engine”.

        I’m pretty sure if you can think of it, it can be done somehow in a game. You know, within reason or compromise or whatever. Just cause some aspect of gameplay isn’t there or doesn’t make sense doesn’t mean it can’t be done, only that the development was limited or lacking a subjective amount of imagination. And for whatever reason, over the years it’s been a bit of a widening gap of what’s acceptable or backslide in regards to ai logic or gameplay mechanics.

        I wish I knew why, all I can do is guess it’s just not something that enough players demand.

        1. Alex says:

          “What amazes me are the excuses that people will come up with to avoid admitting a game's flaws or odd developer's decisions ““ I remember wondering out loud why I wasn't allowed to zoom out or rotate my view during a game of Starcraft 2, or right click my base to constantly produce workers, or why there were no formation commands or behavior modifiers, and my friends were damn near angry about it, going on about how it would “break the engine”.”

          I would assume that in this case it’s because in the land of Actions Per Minute, they are king. They are presumably good at the QTE aspect of Starcraft’s gameplay, and oppose making this micromanagement optional because they don’t want the extra competition.

      4. Felblood says:

        X-COM made it work.

        Before you could produce Elerium clips in quantity, it was crucial to gank your enemies before they got the chance to fire a shot.

        Not only was that less chance of losing a man, but it was also vital resources conserved.

        It did make explosive weapons something of a sophie’s choice, too. I can use grenades and incendiary rockets and improve my chances of keeping the team alive — or I can use my sucky machine guns and recover far more intact alien bodies and equipment.

  13. AR+ says:

    Images are broken on the Neverwinter Nights 2 page.

  14. Abnaxis says:

    None of the images for the NWN2 post load anymore

    EDIT: Beaten to the punch. This is what I get for not refreshing before I post

  15. At around 4:30 Shamus brings up a great point (and it might be worth a article on it’s own Shamus), is that NPCs do not play by the same rules as the player.

    In a lot of games it always irks me when a enemy is slain and the stuff you can loot does not match what they where shooting, using, wearing.
    It also irks me that wildlife carry gold coins or rings items.

    Why don’t enemy NPCs have a limited supply of ammo and health packs (like a player would)?

    Heck, maybe one of the NPCs carry more of one resource than others, finding out info like that could give a tactical advantage to the player.
    “Hmm. Did Mook1 just yell for Mook2 to give him more ammo? Is Mook2 maybe the ammo guy?”

    Also, with a bunch of mooks, one of them is most likely the leader, taking out the leader would demoralize the rest, maybe disorient them for a moment until 2nd in command takes the reigns.

    Two NPCs exchanging ammo or health kits can easily be faked, only the hand out and the receive animation would be needed, the actual throwing or passing would be invisible (unless you got the animation resources to do that as well).

    Just a slight touch of realism or logic can easily get rid of such issues, and bring a lot more subjective depth to a game.

    1. Daemian Lucifer says:

      “Why don't enemy NPCs have a limited supply of ammo and health packs (like a player would)?”

      Its an ai limitation.Youd have to code a lot more of it for cases when they run out of bullets,and for them to spend it wisely but still be a threat.Its not impossible,but it would mean diverting resources from other parts of the game.

      1. SpiritBearr says:

        There are some games where enemies really do only heal with limited health packs (X-Com for one) but the only games, where I’ve had enemies run out of ammo and then at least acknowledge that they are dead, are strategy games (Total War), and Mount and Blade.

        1. Ivan says:

          Yeah, this is a strategy I would sometimes depend on in total war games. It (the limited ammo mechanic) only really works though because there is almost never a reason not to open fire whenever you have the chance in these games. After-all, you’re not dealing with individuals, but entire armies and nations.

    2. Ambitious Sloth says:

      Halo 3 (and maybe its predecessors) had a system where if you killed a group’s leader, their lowest level grunts would panic and run in fear for a while. It was pretty reliable too as unless you were already surrounded the enemies would scatter without a commander to lead them. Letting you take them out one at a time.

      The Halo series though had the advantage of making the leaders obvious since they were always bigger and tougher looking (also they were a different species of alien from the grunts). It would be tricky to communicate that information with only human foes. Unless you had every leader wear bright clothing and maybe a fancy hat.

      1. syal says:

        Make the enemies Aryans and make all the leaders blonde.

  16. newdarkcloud says:

    You guys were wondering what Naughty Dog did before Jak and Daxter, that would be Crash Bandicoot. Naughty Dog made the first three Crash Bandicoot games and Crash Team Racing.

    Then, they made the first Jak and Daxter. This made the dramatic shift in tone between first and second Jak games INCREDIBLY jarring. It began the shift in Naughty Dog game design from colorful and family friendly to darker.

  17. djshire says:

    Ruts ruts ruts ruts, you’re doing it all wrong. Say that it was a baseball or basketball to the face to make it seem like you aren’t incredibly unathletic. :P

    1. Rutskarn says:

      Well, fuck, while I’m at it a guerilla whacked me with a machete and I had to blow him away with a shotgun.

      1. djshire says:

        That’s the spirit!

  18. Joshua says:

    Off topic: I went back to reread your Plot Driven Door post that you linked, and it’s missing the two original pictures you had of the door in question, including the one with all of the suggestions for bypassing the door.

  19. Sleeping Dragon says:

    And on top of everything they are pulling the usual post-a “survival of the fittest” bullshit with the raiders. I seem to remember we’ve already deconstructed this thing during the Walking Dead season so I’m not gonna do that but I would like to say that I’m surprised with how this game can try to have this pretty reasonable approach to its post-apocalypse setting one minute and then slip into some of the dumbest tropes without even a blink.

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